Home Forums Hunting & Shooting The Lefty Forum LH mini-mauser project

Looking good mate,

Sure that it's going to be a great little carbine.

Regards,

Mog

A couple of update photos...





The biggest bit of progress is that I added a forend tip and a grip cap of gaboon ebony. Even though we all like the look, these are way more work than they are worth. Ebony is extremely dense and hard/slow to work. In addition, the dust is a skin and respiratory irritant to most people (myself included.) So even though I try to work covered up, it makes me pretty uncomfortable.

As you see the stock in these photos, it is wet with mineral spirits, which I use to wash the ebony dust off the stock. I am planning to go with some brown stain with a bit of red tint. It should look pretty sharp.

Very nice. That ebony makes it pop.

very nice!

Utah, have you finished this one up yet? I can't wait to see the finished product.

My gun projects always take a backseat during hunting season. I will get after it again one of these days.

But thanks for your interest.

Just caught this thread, very nice.

Finally wrapped this one up.



I should have taken work in progress photos of the bolt side of the stock because it was just as drab, plain, and lifeless as any stick of wood I have ever handled. It was going to need some unconventional tricks to liven it up. I took some hints from TC1's recent thread on finishing, and started with a black filler for the pores. Then I used a combination stain/finish to add some color. I even left some of the stain on in streaks to give it a little variation. I didn't use nearly so much of the stain/finish on the checkpiece side of the stock, which had much more interesting figure and depth.








Added a bit of detail




lovemy99 asked earlier in the thread for a detailed look at the area around the safety...
[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v703/utah708/DSCN5102_zpsumdzzs0j.jpg[/img]

The factory stock had a red plastic plug to indicate the fire position, but I plugged it with wood that I took from under the recoil pad. It is pretty visible in the photo above, but not nearly so visible from the side.

[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v703/utah708/DSCN5103_zpsotyefmmc.jpg[/img]

Comparing the before and after photos of the area around the safety shows the amount of wood that came off quite starkly. The new stock line goes through where the red plug is...
[img]http://img.photobucket.com/alb...20project/DSCN4500_zpsd1e26080.jpg[/img]

I will admit to never being entirely satisfied with how my projects turn out. Always feel like something somewhere is flawed, out-of-whack, amateurish. One thing I was stuck with on this project was the cross section of the pistol grip, which was more of a teardrop than an oval. I stuck with it because I didn't have the gumption to completely reshape that portion of the stock. The grip cap helped a lot, but I am not thrilled with the final product.

[img]http://img.photobucket.com/alb...20project/DSCN5101_zpshkzc1k6i.jpg[/img]

The final stock is 33 oz, so I took off only 5 oz. That comparison is confounded a bit by having added the forend tip and grip cap because ebony is far more dense than the stock. Hopefully the thread has given other people a sense of what basic materials/tools and time can do do to an otherwise uninspiring factory stock.

Thanks for taking us along. It looks great. Do you like the way it handles better now?

It does look really nice. Would you mind divulging the stain you used? I am in the process of redoing one just like this in 223 and I really like the color yours has now

I just used Minwax Polyshades, color is Bombay Mahogany.

Looking good! I love my mini that used to be a 7.62X39.

Utah, your assembly line of drooler rifles continues to boggle my head. You done good on this one! Check your PM

Very nice! If I was so bad with tools and lazy, I'd like to try a project like that for my oldest son (turns 8 this week). Outfitting LH shooting kids with rifles isn't easy or cheap.

Utah how does it feed, both my LH 223 & 7 X 57 required work to feed well. TheKid Brian got them squared a way, both shoot very well.

my LH 223 required a little tinkering to feed. had to bevel the edges of the follower to keep it from binding as it transitioned from the mag body to the receiver.